What makes a solar flare so dangerous?
In: Physics
A solar flare is a burst of electromagnetic energy. This causes disturbances in the earth’s magnetic field, and our magnetic field usually protects electronics on earth from inducting current from all of the EMI. A very strong solar flare could damage electronics on Earth should one ever hit. They aren’t as dangerous to us as they are to our electronics.
because the phenomenon is in essence a huge wave of radiation that batters all the planets of the system
while out atmospshere protects us from the more deadly radiation ,such aan event overwhelms it and charges the particles in it
this is akin to the whole planet being hit by an EMP which cna have dire consequences
Because it consists basically of UV light. UV which is not in the human eye’s vision scale, is a wave. Just like all the things we see and hear, but it behaves way different because that wave has less space between the crests, shortening the wavelenght and changing its frequency
The simple reduction of this frequency can induce the wave to enter to organisms’ cells, and affect the chemical bonds that sustain DNA viable. That’s why it causes mutations (skin cancer, etc).
A solar flare itself is not dangerous. Solar flares often (but not always) cause coronal mass ejections, which are huge clouds of charged particles that can be launched towards earth.
Two things happen when that cloud gets to earth.
1) The particles hit satellites directly. This can corrupt or even destroy processors and memory onboard the satellite, rendering it pretty much brain dead. A brain dead satellite cannot be controlled or orbit corrected, therefore it becomes a hazard to other spacecraft.
2) The particles smash into the earth’s magnetosphere. The magnetosphere then rings like a bell. That ringing can induce very voltages in long wires, such as power transmission and telephone lines. Voltages that power and telephone systems are not equipped to handle. Circuits can blow, transformers can explode, things will get ugly.
On September 1, 1859, a massive flare erupted from the sun and it’s associated CME hit about 16 hours later. For the next day or so, there was a huge magnetic storm that induced currents in telegraph lines. Telegraph operators got zapped and they could actually run the telegraphs without batteries.
March 9, 1989, was another large solar flare that had consequences on Earth. The induced power line currents caused circuit breakers and generators in Quebec to trip out and put a good portion of the province in the dark.
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